1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to liquid ejection apparatuses such as an ink jet record apparatus, a display manufacturing apparatus, an electrode forming apparatus, and a biochip manufacturing apparatus which perform a drawing operation or the like by ejecting liquid from a nozzle.
2. Related Art
In related art, as a liquid ejection apparatus, an ink jet printer (hereinafter, referred to as a printer) which is appropriate for printing on a paper is known. Generally, the printer has a configuration in which a head including a fine nozzle for ejecting liquid (ink) is disposed to be movable in a status the head faces paper.
When the ink within the nozzle is dried, the printer cannot perform normal ejection, and accordingly, the technology for preventing the dryness or restoring moisture from the dry status is very important. Generally, a cap which is used for sealing (capping) an opening of the nozzle is prepared in the printer, and by capping the opening of the nozzle in a standby mode of the printer, the dryness of the ink within the nozzle can be prevented.
In addition, a printer that restores and maintains the performance of ejection by ejecting ink onto something other than a paper face before/after a drawing operation or in the middle of the drawing operation to replace old ink for which a drying process has been progressed in the nozzle with new ink is widely known. The above-described ejection for nozzle maintenance is called preliminary ejection, and in many cases, the preliminary ejection is performed onto a cap.
In related art, an absorber for retaining ink is prepared in a cap, and the sealed internal space by capping is configured to maintain high humidity by the moisture of the ink retained in the absorber. In a printer including a function of the above-described preliminary ejection, there is a case where the ink ejected in the preliminary ejection accelerates the drying process in the capped status on the contrary. This happens since a moisturizing component (glycerin or the like) in a status that contained moisture has been lost is accumulated in the absorber as time passes after the preliminary ejection, and accordingly, the moisturizing component acts for aggressively taking moisture from the ink in the nozzle when the nozzle is capped.
Considering this case, the applicant of the present invention has filed an application for an invention related to a structure of a cap for preventing ink from being remained inside (see Patent Document 1).
Patent Document 1: JP-A-2003-251828
However, although a cap related to the Patent Document 1 can prevent an adverse effect due to a moisturizing component included in ink, a function of maintaining moisture is lost when the cap is used, and a drying process in the nozzle cannot be sufficiently suppressed after being left for a long time.
In addition, when forced discharge of the ink ejected from the preliminary ejection is tried using a suction unit which communicates with the cap in the structure of the cap including an absorber, the ink already has lost much of the moisture to be in a high viscosity status, and accordingly the ink can rarely be discharged.